A taste of what it is like to be a physician in NY under Obamacare

Many lay people have no idea about the number and scope of restrictions and regulations (no, not ALL regulation is bad) that health care professionals must abide by. The face of health care has changed tremendously just in the amount of time it took me to complete medical school and residency – and much of that change was before Obamacare. Every year since the HMO Act of 1973 the federal government has manipulated the system and dictated physician lives but the final straw is Obamacare.

Here is a portion of an email I received from the MSSNY:

NYS regulators are planning to expand the CON (Certificate of Need) process,
enacting even greater restrictions on private practice, small business medicine.
This could be the coupe de grace for physician ownership of any health- related
business in the state. Opportunities for employed doctors will consequently be
limited as a result. Physicians are already banned by Obamacare
from investing in hospitals. This will extend restrictions on
physician participation in the remaining parts of the health care system.
You will no longer be allowed to reinvest in your business in any
meaningful way. Physicians are initiating a special fund under our
MSSNY PAC in order to fight the proposed CON rules. We all have a vested
interest in this issue regardless of one’s mode of practice! If you care about
the right of physicians to invest in the future of our American health care
delivery system like any other American can, then Give Now and Give
Generously. CON will affect all of us, and these restrictions will
ultimately harm our patients. To view the Letter the NYS DOH sent to
stakeholders, see the attachment.

Why is NY State’s Public Health and Health Planning Council (PHHPC) targeting “enhanced physician practices”? For the simple reason that these practices have helped to shield doctors from the under reimbursed costs of Medicare and Medicaid care plans. These highly successful (read “enemy”) practices are very attractive to private health insurers and often limit or restrict Medicare and Medicaid patients.

If you have a business (or know anything about business), try to imagine how the restrictions listed in the email above would affect your ability to thrive.

Just because many physicians go tens of thousands of dollars into debt and spend years getting a license, they believe they should be able to recover their costs and make some money for their efforts. Capitalist scum! B O and Mario’s kid know best. So what if potential doctors don’t go into medicine and others leave, which creates a Doctor shortage when the number of patients is increasing! B O and A C will just shorten the training period to become licensed. Problem solved. What do physicians need all that training for, anyway? Unless of course they are treating our political elite, then, hey, more is good!